Saturday, January 2, 2010

Chaos Theory Questions

Reader Robert Fellner has foolishly been discussing my pamphlet Chaos Theory [.pdf] with people who have yet to see the light. (I do not recommend this.) He turned to me for help in answering their objections, but obviously I am not going to rescue him from the quicksand into which I pushed him. In the comments feel free to offer your own thoughts.

I have been showing Chaos Theory to some friends of mine, and meeting some resistance. If you have the time and any interest in answering them, I've pasted them below. I already answered them myself but I feel I may be missing something. Correct me if I am wrong here, but if someone steals from you, there will exist a private police force that can go on to his property and either retake the item that was stolen or bring him to trial or something of that nature, correct? All acts of aggression aren't blindly outlawed in libertarian society, just the initiation of aggression? That's a pretty important concept for me to have clear, because in my answer to these questions that is basically what I said. That generally speaking theft and murder are against the laws of a libertarian society and there would be private police that could bring these criminals to the private courts even if the criminal was on his own property. Is that not true?

1) I go to a movie theater, and sign a contract saying I waive all liability vs the owner if someone else hauls me away after being found guilty by an arbitration agency. Why would the movie theater owner have any liability in the first place? Does he have some duty to protect me from the acts of third parties while i'm on his property? Where does that duty come from?

1a) Even if I do release HIM from liability why does that in any way suggest that I give my consent to have my actions adjudicated to this arbitration company in the first place?

1b) I sign a contract in a movie theater. The non-cops come to haul me away after being found guilty. I say 'aha, suckers I didn't really sign the contract'. They all look and I've signed it 'Ludwig Von Nutjob'. I say this is not real consent you can't touch me. They say it is, or at least we have to go arbitrate this. I say I'm not consenting to any arbitration on the validity of my consent. How do you resolve?

2) This contact I sign at the movie theater apparently has quite a number of things in it. It says I can be hauled away if guilty of a tort, it says I wont murder anyone, it says i wont steal anything, etc etc. Apparently it has the entire codification of a legal system and tort system all in it with my consent to each clause. Am I really expected to read such a thing before entering a movie theater? Such a system apparently exists EVERYWHERE, because everywhere is private property right? I can't go run errands without signing 5 or more of these contracts. In fact, even the road is private property right? How do I sign a contract to use it before I get on it? How does such a system sound remotely enactable?

3) I'm super rich. Like Bill Gates rich. I don't like you. I kill you. I pay the damages. I don't care. I promise never to do it again, and get an insurer to cover me for an inordinate sum at a hefty premium in the future. Do I get to go free? Why not?

4) I kill you. Having subscribed to Austrian Economics and anarcho-capitalism for many years, you are now homeless on the street with no friends or heirs. Who investigates and prosecutes the crime? Who pays for it?

5) I kill you. I live on a farm, and am entirely self sufficient. I ain't coming out. No one can touch me right?

6) I'm broke and have no insurance. Can I even set foot anywhere or will no one let me in because I can't afford to sign the extensive contract?

7) I'm a good friend of a very reputable arbitration agency owner. I get in massive trouble in a complicated case and conveniently his firm is the arbiter of the dispute. He fixes the case as the only disincentive is damage to his firm's reputation for trustworthiness. Since its just a one time thing not a systemic pattern the damage is minimal. There is some flap about the ruling being suspicious in the press, but he notes his firm has a 50 year history and did a fair job. Since most of the public didn't follow the case super closely they don't know how valid the ruling really is, nor are they very motivated to look into it deeply. I give him a million dollars for his trouble, and we all live happily ever after.

Something that jumps out at me immediately before I have even gotten through all of these questions is this:

Right now, the government has the right to act as the private police would. If you're accused of a crime by the criminal justice system, the police can and will march right onto your property and haul you away for trial.

So, in that situation (and re-use this logic for other situations because the principle is the same), why would it be okay for the government authorities to do that, but not okay for the private authorities to do that?

In other words, where does the "authority" of the public agents come from that makes them necessarily legitimate in their actions whereas the private agents lack this legitimacy? (The answer is usually something like democracy, good intentions, history, god, etc., all of which are faulty premises)

The issue is that it is precisely not acceptable for the government to claim authority in these situations and I agree their reasons such as democracy etc for doing so are all faulty premises. So this is the problem. How do we rid ourselves of government, create a society of anarchy, but still have authoritative type institutions such a police and law, and do it in accordance with libertarian principles.

My feeling is that the system of law will be rooted at its base in the non aggression principle, and expand outward as outlined in "the ethics of liberty" by Rothbard. From here we would have a private system of laws and courts, and emerging legal experts just like we do today, that could clarify and work on the technicalities and details such as the signing of a contract, but with a false name and how to deal with that etc.

The issue still remains of, if someone is on his own property whom never agrees to any of these rules and laws, and commits an act of aggression, do you have the right and are you within the libertarian framework to extract him from his property and assign a punishment.

I feel that the answer to this must be yes, and its authority stems from the ethics of liberty in which Rothbard, quite correctly in my view, takes a rational scientific approach to outlining natural law and more specifically the nature of man. Here, if one could demonstrate that it violates the very nature of being human to be the aggressor against another, we can now attempt a platform in which a retaliation of aggression in the form of retribution or punishment would be acceptable within the libertarian framework.

Hi, I am the author of the questions posted in Robert Fellner's email.

I am surprised at your statement that you feel discussion of your pamphlet with people who are not already converted is a foolish effort. One would think that most of the point of writing pamphlets is to persuade people to come around to your way of thinking. If the pamphlet is just for people who 'have seen the light', why bother writing it?

I would be interested in hearing you flesh out your system in a bit more depth, and with regard to more criminal and less tortious scenarios. I have read your pamphlet, and discussed the situation in (painful) depth with Mr. Fellner. Can you spell out in more detail how we evolve as a justice system from a 'sign an arbitration contract for everything' into the market demanding and creating an independent police force and judiciary who apply more traditional concepts of justice? Or do we?

I also don't see how a system that uses 'profitability as the standard' is compatible with a criminal justice system. Sometimes our sense of justice requires us to ignore the future equity and punish past acts.

In response to your comment above, I'm not at all concerned with the 'right to act' of either the government in the state system or the actors in your system. I'm just trying to imagine if your system is even coherent logically.

I would appreciate if you did answer at least some of my questions from Mr. Fellner's email. Please ignore question 1 and 1a, i misunderstood his hypothetical.

Sorry I was making a joke with those remarks. I have had these types of discussions since I wrote the pamphlet (in grad school) and I am burned out. I'm not saying they're bad questions, I just personally don't have the energy right now.

I have a comment about GrimHogun's statement about the nature of man. Much as we might like to imagine that is against the nature of man to perform acts of aggression against one another, and much as we might like to live in a society free from such acts, the anthropological evidence simply does not support any such claim. To the contrary, numerous studies indicate that the natural state of man is one of routine violence towards one another. I would refer you to studies on the Yanomamo Indians in South America, as well, more peripherally, studies on violence in other great ape species.

The fact that man is by nature violent does not in any way diminish my desire to live in a society free of violence. I am simply making the argument that we should not be trying to construct a society based on evolutionary biology, but rather on something much more nebulous: an approximate set of shared values and/or wishes for our lives. Immediately a problem becomes apparent- we do not all share the exact same values. In a society where the values of the group (or of anyone, really) are imposed on all the members, such as societies with despots or elected government, the problem of how do we decide on the law is solved, albeit never to the satisfaction of all parties. In a hypothetical modern day society without a ruling body of any sort, should there be rules which bind us all, even without our explicit consent?

If yes, what are they? I strongly believe that the devil is in the details here. You can't say that theft is illegal, because you would have to define theft. I don't believe it is ad easy as it sounds. Howabout murder? Try it. Then ask yourself about the exceptions, the possible complicated and unclear scenarios. There is no chance that all people will agree on all details of what does or does not constitute one of these acts. If not all people agree on what the law should be, then we either have to live without it, or have a mechanism to enforce laws on people without their consent.

If no, then on what authority does any person go onto the property of an aggressor and "extradite" him into the hands of a private justice system? I'm assuming here that the aggressor did not violate any contracts that he may have had with anyone. It seems like a violation of libertarian principles to impose upon this man laws which he never consented to.

Would love to hear comments, especially ones with detailed explanations about the nitty gritty.

I think you may have misunderstood me. I agree with you 100 percent that there is strong evidence to suggest man is an aggressive violent beast. And I would have no problem with someone saying that human beings are aggressive or violent by nature. I'm not saying its true, but I certainly couldn't argue the point. However that was not what I said. What I said was, "If one could demonstrate that it violates the very nature of being human to be the aggressor against another." Meaning that if man's nature is to interact with the world around him, own manifestations of his labor mixed with the earth (property) and so forth, than clearly any act that would impede him from doing so would be a violation of his natural rights and forbidden.

The question isn't, "Would anarcho-capitalism be nirvana?" since nirvana isn't an option under it or under a State. The question is, "Could people figure out social order without accepting a Hobbesian State?"

There are answers to each of your problems. Most all of your problems already exist in some form or another (if not much worse) in what we have under a State.

People used to thinking about the State providing things they want for them are in a similar position to people in the USSR wondering where shoes and food comes from if Moscow doesn't provide it for them. "How does Paris get fed?" It isn't because the King decided how to get the food there.

Apathy,I can understand Bob's weariness of answering the questions if he wrote the thing in grad school, Im in college now and every time i bring up ancap society, my friends have so many questions and rebuttals.

I want to take a stab at a lot of your questions in one answer: people aren't perfect. yes you can come up with a million hypothetical situations (i have heard many of them) where the murder would get away or the private police will abuse their power in an ancap society. it will happen. The important question i ask people that ask these hypotheticals is: "doesn't this already happen now on a larger scale?"

Government politicians (in the U.S. and elsewhere) and agents murder and rob people every day. Mobsters get away with crimes and pay off public servants. Judges and cops help their buddies out of jams.

In an private law/Ancap society these people would still be there. people will get away with murder and hide behind their property. people will rob one another and start wars. the difference is that in a private society, funding for such wars and the consequences of such robberies are bore by the parties involved, and aren't taken from other via taxes. So while it is possible that an arbitration guy gets his buddy out of a jam and gets away with injustice, it would not be systematic like it is today, as the firms success is built on reputation and undercutting competition rather than simply keeping the masses from rebelling.

I was talking about this very thing to a buddy on new years at a party (i know, we are dorks). He kept saying, "I just don't see it working." and then brought up a hypothetical of the road owner charging 6 billion dollars to travel, but he failed to see what roads are used for. I think many roads and "public services" will be free with advertising. imagine the McDonald's Interstate or the Microsoft lane. Walmart has a parking lot, but doesn't charge you to park there, the WANT you to travel to their place! stores might offer to pay for road upkeep as advertisement, to boost customers or something.

Hope that helps, and go easy on Bob, he is busy finding the cure to baldness ;-)

And i didn't mean to imply all judges and cops/Gov workers try to screw people over. I know there are good decent folks working gov jobs. the problem is the incentive structures in the state funded jobs which encourage the bad habits of man at the cost of others.

Meaning that if man's nature is to interact with the world around him, own manifestations of his labor mixed with the earth (property) and so forth...

Presumably this is something like the axiom upon which libertarian principles rest. However, I see no particular justification for why it should be true. It's certainly not the case that in a state of nature man owns the products of his labor and his land. It's only true until the next door neighbor comes at him with a spear.

I totally get being burned out. After one email thread with Grimhogun, i'm nearly burned out already.

For the people who did respond-The present justice system certainly has lots of flaws. I'm not trying to claim its perfect or anything of the sort. But it is logically coherent. It can deal with all of these hypotheticals, at least in theory. When something goes wrong with a criminal case it is usually despite the system's ideals, not because of it. In other words, many of the problems are problems in appplication, not systemic logic problems.

The few details I have seen of 'ancap' private justice do not seem logically sound or workable. To counter with 'other systems have problems too' is not really the point at this stage. To suggest 'people will always find ways to beat the system' again is not the point. I'm not talking about people finding loopholes, i'm talking about your system as described just not dealing well with even common scenarios. Why don't you take a stab at some of the particular questions and we'll see if we can poke some holes in ancap justice logic?

No, Apathy's reasoning does not depend in any way on the premise that a government judicial system is just.

He (and I) would like to see a construction of a private justice system that, at least in principle, looks logically coherent. We have yet to do so. We are asking questions designed to get responses with some of the gaping holes we see. None of this has anything whatsoever to do with a government run justice system. It seems like your (and others') arguments frequently dissolve into, well it's even worse under a government justice system. But as Apathy has pointed out, you're not comparing apples to apples. We're talking about the THEORETICAL construction of justice. The problems with our present justice system (to take one example of a government run justice system) all seem to be problems in practice, not in theory. There would be plenty of problems in practice for a private justice system too, and there's no chance we will anticipate all of them. Since no such system exists, we have no way of knowing how bad those problems will be. But if we can't even see a theoretical construction which is coherent, how could a private justice system possibly be good in practice? To me this is a necessary but not sufficient condition.

Correct me if I'm wrong but part of what you're trying to do is decide if a public or private provision of justice is more preferable. You are hung up on whether or not a private system is even possible (logically coherent) and as of right now the fact that it isn't (in your mind) necessitates that a public system is preferential.

I'm asking you, before you even get into comparative statics, how a public justice system is logically coherent when it relies on violating justice (taxation, monopoly on force) to provide its results? I'm happy to do my best to answer your specific questions but first there needs to be an understanding by everyone involved as to whether or not the provision of justice and law by government can be just in the first place.

A lot of the "unworkable" problems of the private system are currently made "workable" in the current system because we've intellectually granted the government the right to violate justice without logical penalty.

Apathy, while I'm no Murphy/an-cap scholar, I'll take a stab at your questions.

1b) This scenario can be resolved by taking the evidence to your insurer/creditor. Your insurer/creditor will then either force you to take it to arbitration, or will go to arbitration on your behalf. If you are found guilty, you will lose credit.

2) Implicit contracts could still exist, with specific court perhaps specializing in implicit contracts. You never need to sign a contract when you walk into McDonald's, since it is implicit from the 'Enter' sign and explicit nature of the business that they want you in there. These sort of things are still possible and indeed desirable and necessary for the success of an an-cap society.

3) This all depends on the arbitration court where you were prosecuted. If the arbitration court feels as though a fine is enough justice, and the prosecuting party doesn't like it, then they can complain about the ruling. If the court agrees to reassess their case, then problem solved; if it doesn't, then the court loses credit with its future customers.

4) I am completely confused by the wording of this question. If you kill me, is it really necessary to state that I would be homeless/friendless??? Here's what I take to be your question:

How do poor people get justice?

Well, you seem to be forgetting institutions of charity. People are still free to work pro bono, and set up organizations to help the poor or those unfairly discriminated against; organizations such as the ACLU. In fact, most an-caps contend that because there no longer exists a taxing state, people will be generally richer and will give more to charity.

5) While this seems like a very tricky situation, I believe I have a solution:I can hire a police firm to extract you from your property and bring you to arbitration. Since you are being accused of destroying someone else's property(=life), then the court would be justified in concluding that removing you from your property was legitimate use of force.

6) The answer to this question is implicit in my answers to 2) and 4).

7) This was pretty much answered by Michael. No one is saying that the an-cap system will be perfect. But, it would be much better than any system under a state. Because if a cop or politician is found to be corrupt, who loses money? The typical answer is everyone, except the corrupt 'public servant' and his acquaintances. Because in the end, people are forced to arbitrate with the government, and to follow the laws of only the government. In a private system, the people would be free to move to other services, and those believed to be partaking in immoral acts will at the very least suffer financially (in losing business), if not personally and professionally (in losing credit and being unable to land a similar job).

No, the current system DOESN'T work in theory. And yes, the fact that it is full of entrenched corruption IS the point.

How does the theory work that the State defends private property and liberty when it is the prime violator of private property and liberty? This is a big theoretical hole.

Once you give a group of people a socially accepted monopoly on "justice" the incentives are all downward. In a kingdom, the king at least as the restraint of needing to exploit his people rationally in order to get the most out of them over his and his heirs lifetime, but elected politicians have the incentive to destroy property rights to pander to the most numerous group as quickly as possible, since he is a renter of society, and not an owner.

I suggest reading Bob's articles as he mentioned, I also suggest Bryan Caplan's Anarchist FAQ (http://economics.gmu.edu/bcaplan/anarfaq.htm#part11b), and there are a great many pieces on mises.org you should read/listen to also about libertarian punishment theory, the myth of national defense, etc..

You guys keep saying these folks are bringing up problems in practice, this isn't true - governments are systemically prone to behave in certain ways and we know this based on theory. It's like people who say "well sure, communism and socialism has always failed in practice, but thats because of...". It's not true, we know theoretically that these practical roadblocks will always develop because of the structure of incentives.

Heres a few answers from the way I see it:

2) Why would the Movie theater need you to sign anything saying you won't kill people? Why would you need to sign anything from the movie theater? Do you have to sign anything at a restaurant today in order to get served? Don't we have some social norms and conventions that kind of clear that whole thing up - I go to the diner and eat a steak, there is an assumption that I was planning on paying for that steak. If I go to the theater it's a safe assumption that if I kill someone there then I will be held liable...

On roads: Entrepreneurs will figure it out, just look at technology like EZPass. You put it on your car, end of the month you get a bill from all the roads you used. What if someone refuses to use one? then the private cops patrolling the private road will remove you from traffic.

3) No, rich folks do not get a free pass. Look up Libertarian punishment theory. I am particularly fond of Walter Blocks "2 teeth + cost of capture + scaring". I don't want to go into it, but basically that bit about scaring can be like russian roulette where people are subjected to a probability of death for certain acts (like 1 bullet in a 8 chamber gun, or x chamber gun, w/e). Would Bill Gates be willing to kill people if it meant he has 12.5% chance of dying?

4) There may be a number of people/firms with a financial or other (maybe.. moral) interest in finding my killer. My insurance/security company will lose money on my death, if they find you they can recoup their losses. Imagine a private detective who says "If I find and catch the killer, then I want x% of the reward or lawsuit" I think that'd sound like a good deal to widows, and children of the deceased. There could be charities, churches, etc. that would be willing to put up money for this type of thing.

5) If you killed me, then my security company is coming after you. Being on a self-sufficient farm means nothing. They are fully within the right to go and get you, and bring you to justice.

6) No insurance? Might I recommend a gun? It's a pretty cheap way to stay safe. I don't see any problem with you being able to mingle with people. You just aren't as safe as you could be because people don't have to be as afraid of post-death retribution from your agency.

7) The answer to this one is basically, competitive pressure works to keep arbitrators honest. These insurance agency's are already contracted with you in how they are to deal with these kinds of disputes.Joe - represented by firm ARob - represented by firm BFirm A & B see if the are in agreement as to who is at fault, lets say they disagree. Then the case goes to 3rd party - and mutually respected by A and B, firm C. Firm C's ruling then becomes final.

The answer then is, if firm C is in your pocket then either: a) my firm has great incentive to make sure our arbitrator is fair and non biased (otherwise they lose a greater % of cases then they would have, causing business harm) b) after the fact, my firm would no longer be willing to do business with firm C because of their ethics.

Yes, my ultimate goal is to decide if a private or public justice system is preferable.

"I'm asking you, before you even get into comparative statics, how a public justice system is logically coherent when it relies on violating justice (taxation, monopoly on force) to provide its results?"

You state here that the legal system under government is not logically coherent, because you see taxation (and other things) as a violation of justice. There is a world of difference between "just" and "logically coherent". You disagree that the people as a whole need a governing body, and that this governing body should have the right to compel its citizens to contribute money and obey its directives. Ok. That doesn't make the system incoherent. A system where there is either no consequence to murdering someone (farmer on his own land, no contracts, fires a ballistic missile into Chicago (I never liked Chicago anyways)), or the consequence stems from someone sending in a police force on whose authority exactly?? is not coherent.

There have been two replies which addressed the scenario of the self-sufficient farmer who kills someone (he has no signed contracts which consent to submit to any arbitration authority or similar)

Joe:5) If you killed me, then my security company is coming after you. Being on a self-sufficient farm means nothing. They are fully within the right to go and get you, and bring you to justice.

Anonymous:5) While this seems like a very tricky situation, I believe I have a solution:I can hire a police firm to extract you from your property and bring you to arbitration. Since you are being accused of destroying someone else's property(=life), then the court would be justified in concluding that removing you from your property was legitimate use of force.

Joe: Why is your security firm in the right to invade my land and do their will with me? Right defined by whom? I have not violated any contracts. I am subject to no one. I do not recognize your security firm's right to decide whether or not I have committed a "crime".

Anonymous:Again, I do not recognize the right of your court to rule on my actions. You think it's a good idea for a private court (one which I never agreed to be subject to) to be entitled to decide on whether or not the use of force was justified against me? You'll note that there is no free market requirement that this court be fair. My buddy can create a court company called WeRuleHowYouWantCourt. I send in my police force, aptly name WeRobYouPolice, and haul you in front of the judge. He rules that you are guilty, and the penalty is you give me all your stuff. Use of force by me was justified according to the court. These entities that I've employed are kept in business by people like me, rather than people who are seeking fairness, etc. Since I don't need your consent to make you subject to my court, everything I've done seems to be consistent with your societal structure.

2) Why would the Movie theater need you to sign anything saying you won't kill people? Why would you need to sign anything from the movie theater? Do you have to sign anything at a restaurant today in order to get served? Don't we have some social norms and conventions that kind of clear that whole thing up - I go to the diner and eat a steak, there is an assumption that I was planning on paying for that steak. If I go to the theater it's a safe assumption that if I kill someone there then I will be held liable...

The reason you don't have to sign anything in a restaurant today is that even without your consent, you are deemed to be subject to the laws of your government. This allows the restaurant owner to have recourse against you should you fail to do what is expected (pay for dinner after you eat it), and perhaps more importantly, he knows that he can call the police and he knows that YOU know he can call the police. There are disincentives for you to eat your meal and then walk away. If I am not subject to any authority, the restaurant owner would not be able to serve me my steak so blithely.

I also would like to comment on the things you said about "assumptions" and "social norms". The reason that I don't walk into a restaurant, order a steak, eat it, and then claim I thought he was just giving me the steak, and had no intention of buying it, is that I am subject to the law of the land. I anticipate trying to convince a jury that I was not stealing, and I anticipate failing in my attempt, and I anticipate going to jail or paying a nasty fine. Therefore I do not try this. Under contract law, it is NOT a safe assumption that I am planning on paying for my steak, or that murder is illegal on the premises, or rape, or peddling pornography, or stealing songs off the internet, or a myriad of other things.

Joe: Why is your security firm in the right to invade my land and do their will with me? Right defined by whom? I have not violated any contracts. I am subject to no one. I do not recognize your security firm's right to decide whether or not I have committed a "crime".

When you killed me you violated the Non-Aggression Principle. The crime is you took my life, it doesn't matter if you didn't have a contract or don't recognize my security agency - the point is I recognized my security agency and I gave them my right to aggress against an initial aggressor in order for me & my agency to be made whole in the event of a crime.

When I say they are 'in the right' to do something, then I mean they are justified in their actions.

I have the right to self-ownership, which means I can aggress against people who aggress against my persons. Well I contracted that right to self-ownership of mine out to my agency, they protect my persons as well and make sure things work out well for me and my loved ones and I pay them in return.

"I am subject to the law of the land. I anticipate trying to convince a jury that I was not stealing, and I anticipate failing in my attempt, and I anticipate going to jail or paying a nasty fine."

This all applies to an Anarchocapitalist world as well. There are still repercussions for stealing, and still fines (prolly more fines, and way less jail, but thats a dif convo).

"If I am not subject to any authority"

But you are, in the event of a crime you will be beholden to the restaurant owners security agency and their arbitrators. What makes you think his security agency isn't parked down the street only a phone call away?

Now we're getting somewhere. Who defines or defined this Non-Aggression Principle? Who decides whether an act is an aggression against someone else? I refer you to my earlier post of Jan 3rd, 12:09 AM, last sentence of the second paragraph and the entire third paragraph.

Alrighty. I'll admit, I must've missed that section when I went over the comments. Now that I see you were missing this cornerstone it makes sense many of the questions you asked.

The Non-Aggression Principle (or sometimes called Axiom) is indeed an objective code of ethics which, when paired with private property, creates a framework for understanding when the use of force (aggression, w/e) is permitted.

Rothbard: "No one may threaten or commit violence ('aggress') against another man's person or property. Violence may be employed only against the man who commits such violence; that is, only defensively against the aggressive violence of another. In short, no violence may be employed against a nonaggressor. Here is the fundamental rule from which can be deduced the entire corpus of libertarian theory."

I dunno exactly who first coined the term, but it was used extensively by Murray Rothbard coming from his Self-Ownership argument (which I touched on a bit). Herbert Spencer had something like it called "The law of equal freedom", Benjamin Franklin epitomized it in that famous quote "my right to swing my fist ends at the tip of your nose".

Walter Block explains it really well, if you have time I think watching some of his lectures of Mises.org in the media section is really beneficial.

Ex: I run up and grab your hat and run away.

Was it a crime?

This is where private property comes in. We need to know who has the rightful claim to the property, and then we can identify the victim from the aggressor.

If it was my hat, and you stole it last night, and I am just now retrieving it - then it was no crime.

On the other hand, if it was your hat and I just plan took it with no claim to it and no agreement with you then I committed the crime.

Here's a good PDF from Stephan Kinsella that talks about this stuff. "What Libertarianism Is"http://www.stephankinsella.com/wp-content/uploads/publications/kinsella_what-libertarianism-is-2009.pdf

Again, before we go into comparative statics, saying you prefer the current system of publicly provisioned justice because it is more logical (or even logical) seems incorrect. My reasoning, which I've provided multiple times now, is as follows:

"I want to provide everyone with a system of justice. I define justice as a situation in which no one violates anyone else's rights or, when a person's rights are violated, they have the right to recourse to punish the rights violator or extract compensation. To provide this system of justice, I will violate people's rights by collecting taxes."

This is not logical, if by logical we mean using a thought process that is not erroneous.

What you have not explained is why, under a system of public law/justice, a government employee can violate justice to provision others with justice (collect taxes to support himself) but if this same person were to do this privately under an an-cap system, you would consider him a violent aggressor and a criminal.

You can't have a discussion with other people in which you define your terms (justice, for example) differently depending upon whether you're talking about public or private activities.

Until you rectify this confusion in your own terminology (your logic), I think you'll be spinning your wheels in trying to find an answer and will ultimately be talking past everybody who is trying to help you.

The reason that I don't walk into a restaurant, order a steak, eat it, and then claim I thought he was just giving me the steak, and had no intention of buying it, is that I am subject to the law of the land.

Well, it's nice for us to all know the quality of your character so that we may avoid you in our own personal lives. :)

As for many other people, myself included, we are guided in our actions by more than simply what the "law of the land" is... something called a conscience, informed by a personal philosophy. You may want to look into that sometime.

I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume your last post was tongue in cheek. If not, it seems pretty out of line to me. My personal ethics have absolutely nothing to do with the discussion.

As I'm sure you would agree, it's sometimes convenient in a hypothetical to use "I" instead of creating a fictitious character and attributing actions or thoughts to that character.

"I want to provide everyone with a system of justice. I define justice as a situation in which no one violates anyone else's rights or, when a person's rights are violated, they have the right to recourse to punish the rights violator or extract compensation. To provide this system of justice, I will violate people's rights by collecting taxes."

The last sentence is the crux. If the two choices in front of you were complete lawlessness or a system of justice run by the government, and taxes levied in order to fund that government, I would choose the latter, and I would not consider the resultant system flawed by the nature of its creation. As a matter of fact, I do believe those are the choices being presented to me.

Alright, so do you want to debate about how various character flaws might manifest themselves into distressing social interactions, or do you want to discuss a "universal man"?

If you want to debate how a particular person who only follows "the law of the land" might react, I'm not sure why you find private law so distressing... it's the law of the land, so this person should have no trouble abiding.

I see this discussion quickly getting off track because extremities and contingencies are being addressed before principles are being discussed and agreed upon. That was why I began these comments with an observation regarding consistent principles. But no one seems to see any value in that approach and the dialog is quickly spinning off base as a result.

Cart before the horse. Flying before wings. Etc. etc.

I can't tell if you and Apathy are actually trying to understand this or if you're trying to blow holes in everything any way you can.

If you're really trying to understand this, might I politely and humbly re-suggest that we all first come to an agreement about whether or not government provision of law/justice is:

1.) just2.) possible

?

I think these discussions are difficult to have when one of the participants insists on using the premise "government justice is both just and possible" and then saying "impress me" in regards to private law, from there. The irony of the whole thing is that if anything it should be reversed... private law is the only system that is actually JUST, from there we can discuss possibility, but it is the private law people, who want to do nothing to nobody, who should demand "impress me" from the government-apologist aggressors.

But, that'd be the rational, logical expectation in a just world. We don't live in a just world. We live in a massively delusional, topsy-turvy, right-is-left-left-is-right-up-is-down-down-is-up world so I can see how I'm asking a bit much.

Question 4 hits on an important point. According to the Austro-Libertarian theory, retaliation for rights violations is inherently personal. A cannot punish B for violating C's rights unless C agrees or has sold/contracted this right to A. So in the case of murder, it's not clear who would have the right to seek reparations from the murderer. Of course people could put in their will that they are leaving the right to any enforcement actions they have to a particular person (presumably you would want to leave it to someone you're pretty sure won't try to kill you). But if for whatever reason someone doesn't do this, then the murderer can't be touched.

The merits of the present system have zippo to do with the current conversation. Your relentless argument that taxation is illegitimate and corrupts everything else is neither relevant nor persuasive to us. All we want to do at this point is understand how ancap works. Saying the present system is based on an illegitimate premise does not in any way further our understanding of your alternate paradigm. Adding in ad hominem attacks on obvious hypotheticals also just makes you look like a loon playing a broken record.

As for the other replies, thank you and I agree this is helpful. Unfortunately its filled with links and references I don't have the time to go through at the moment (away for most of the week) I will try to read them and see what thoughts I have after.

If the two choices in front of you were complete lawlessness or a system of justice run by the government, and taxes levied in order to fund that government, I would choose the latter, and I would not consider the resultant system flawed by the nature of its creation. As a matter of fact, I do believe those are the choices being presented to me.

In order:

1.) You start with a false dichotomy. But you don't realize it's a false dichotomy because your imagination fails you into believing it could be anything other than reality. That's, honestly, your problem, not anybody else's.

"If we have to choose between everyone starving or the government controlling food production, I choose government food production."

Do you see why this is a false dichotomy in this example situation? If you do, can you try to extend that analysis to what you said?

2.) Strictly speaking, if the "choice" were between lawlessness and government law... that does not speak to the justness of the government provision of law, whatsoever. You may attempt an odd, objective-value-based comparison of net utilities under the two systems (which you'd fail in because value is subjective), but you would not be able to say, "Because the alternative is private individuals wantonly violating each other's rights, the government and its agents are justified in wantonly violating individuals' rights."

3.) Building on 1.) and 2.) and your statement that "I would not consider the resultant system flawed by the nature of its creation", this is again a failure of your own logical processes if you mean to make "justice" a consistent term in the discussion.

Imagine (I know this might be hard for you): I am out there, minding my own business, keeping myself quite secure and safe, etc. all on my own. Meanwhile, nearby, some other people are having trouble with this, perhaps including you. You, demanding justice, form a government to institute law over these lawless rabble... and you show up on my doorstep to levy your tax to support your lawgiving operation.

The question for you is: where did you get the right to impose your law and your taxes on me?

4.) Final point, and this is just reiterating what I've said above, to drive it home: initiating the use of force against people, or calling for its initiation, is not a "choice" that is open to you or anyone else to make. If it is, then stealing because you're hungry, or stealing because you need shelter, or stealing because you need college tuition money, are all provided for under your rubric of "making a choice for justice"

If you're really trying to understand this, might I politely and humbly re-suggest that we all first come to an agreement about whether or not government provision of law/justice is:

1.) just2.) possible

I can't speak for Apathy or Pugnacious, but I think that the government provision of law/justice is both possible and just. Arguments to the contrary, I've noticed, tend to rely on general principles that, while they sound good in the abstract, have absurd implications. If a principle has absurd implications, then it is an absurd principle, and ought to be rejected.

It appears obvious to me at this point that trying to point out the contribution your flawed premises play in your inability to understand how ancap "works" are entirely futile, and I thank you for pointing this out. I won't bother any longer and I wish everybody luck in trying to explain something to people who do not share their premises.

Thanks for your replies. However, I do not see an answer to my concerns. The issue is that whatever the formulation is for what defines "aggressor" and what is natural law, people will disagree on the interpretation and scope. We're talking here not about contract law, but laws which would apply WITHOUT a person's explicit consent. If we cannot all agree on the correct interpretation of what constitutes an act of aggression, what constitutes a response to an act of aggression, what constitutes a threat, etc., then who is to decide the details? Why do they get to decide?

Having learned from my last experience, I am creating a fictional character named Taylor.

Taylor believes that abortion is murder. He therefore believes that he is justified in imprisoning women who attempt to have an abortion (say he bribes a doctor to deliver the woman to him instead of performing the procedure) in order to prevent her from committing a crime against man. Or alternately, if you would like a scenario where Taylor suffers damages himself, Taylor impregnates a woman out of wedlock, then she gets an abortion from Doctor Bob. Taylor sues Bob on the grounds that Bob killed his unborn child, and he suffered pain and mental anguish as a result. Would you still feel the same if it was a day old baby instead of a fetus? Howabout if Taylor's former lover were 9 month pregnant? 8? 6? Doctor Bob is also a farmer. He practices on his own farm. He has not violated any contract with the woman, nor has he signed any contracts with me. I have no recourse under contract law, in other words. Has Doctor Bob committed an act of aggression towards me, which I can therefore retaliate against?

I am a talented musician, and write and record a song in mp3 format. I sell the song to Jill. Our contract stipulates that she is not allowed to copy the digital song that is now on her computer, or I have legal recourse. The aforementioned Taylor visits Jill and unbeknownst to to Jill, copies the song before he leaves to go back to his farm (yup, he's a farmer too). I believe I have no recourse against Taylor under contract law, since he and I have no agreements with one another. Moreover, would Jill have recourse against Taylor? In other words, is copying an idea, algorithm, song, computer program, book, molecular formula, etc. "theft"? Surely we don't all agree on precisely what constitutes theft of intellectual property, do we? If we don't agree, whose version is right?

Several times I've heard statements such as "Violence may be employed only against the man who commits such violence; that is, only defensively against the aggressive violence of another."

Taylor and I meet in a dark alley. Actually, I own one end of the alley, and he owns the other end, so we're both standing on our own property. Unsurprisingly, we've been arguing. He pulls out a loaded gun and points it at me. He announces he will shoot me in 2 seconds. I quickly pull out one of my many pistols and shoot him. Am I justified in doing so? Surely I'm entitled to protect myself from physical harm PRIOR to that harm befalling me. But what is the standard for a credible threat? If he had been holding a carrot instead of a gun, would I still have been justified? It's dark in the alley. Maybe I couldn't see, and I happen to know that Taylor has a short temper and owns and carries many guns on him at all times. Taylor's next of kin now invades my end of the alley and detains me, and brings me in front of what court exactly? Why am I subject to Taylor's next of kin's choice of court?

"Thanks for your replies. However, I do not see an answer to my concerns. The issue is that whatever the formulation is for what defines "aggressor" and what is natural law, people will disagree on the interpretation and scope."

You are very welcome! I am enjoying this dialogue quite a bit, as I think you raise a variety of very legitimate issues concerning anarchy.

Regarding interpreting and measuring the scope for various infringements of the law, I would imagine that there will probably arise an entire industry of legal and judicial experts to address and constantly refine the law to attempt to resolve such intricacies.

The foundation of the law, one of natural rights, will not be subject to revision however. And it is irrelevant if someone disagrees or misinterprets the nature of being human just as much as if one claimed to disagree with the nature of copper as a metal.

My point is that you and I already do not agree on the foundation of law. We just don't know precisely in what ways we disagree.

Regarding this industry of legal experts, that's lovely, but as you pointed out they cannot address the foundation of law.

If you can, please explain what natural law claims is the "obvious, self-evident, logically (even scientifically) deduced" answer to each of my three latest hypothetical scenarios. Who is the aggressor and why in each case?

I'm working now, but I can't let you think you've won with my silence so here goes:

Abortion would be allowed. Fetuses are not capable of human type behavior such as interacting with the world around them, owning property etc.

There is no such thing as intellectual property rights.

Your last example is kinda retardo in my view, as that is a difficult situation in any legal realm. However I would imagine that if someone threatens to aggress upon you in a deadly manner you would be entitled to defend yourself.

While typing this I smashed a guy so badly to commit 2 buyins with 6% equity vs me.

Yes, as long as you felt it was a credible threat and that your life was in eminent danger.

"But what is the standard for a credible threat? If he had been holding a carrot instead of a gun, would I still have been justified?"

If you sincerely though he was about to kill you then you thought it was credible. If you sincerely believed he was about to kill you with a carrot, then yes you would be justified in defending yourself with violence. The courts would decide after the fact if it was indeed a 'credible, justified' use of force.

Things like this, what is 'credible' or how much force is 'excessive' tend to be lines in the sand which we can't really figure out with armchair theorizing. IMO, it's easy to see a world where these rules of thumb and norms begin to emerge in the security and law marketplace. Ways of doing business and operating that are good will proliferate and ways that the consumer disagrees with will tank, invisible hand, etc. etc..

"Taylor's next of kin now invades my end of the alley and detains me, and brings me in front of what court exactly?"

Taylor's insurane/security contract would have stipulated what court his agency sends initial claims to, or who the final arbitrator is, etc.

"Why am I subject to Taylor's next of kin's choice of court?"

It would be Taylors agency's choice of court, as per contract as stated above.

Why am I subject to Taylor's choice of court? I never agreed to that. If you tell me it's the risk I take by living next to a nutjob like Taylor, I sympathize. However, what if it was actually a visitor to Taylor's land instead, rather than Taylor himself. I can't predict who will visit my neighbors and who their courts will be.

Regarding Pugnacious' hypotheticals, I think it's important to distinguish between what (we think) is the right outcome in a given case, and the outcome (we think) would tend to be reached in a situation of ordered anarchy. In a anarchist society you are going to have a bunch of competing court systems and a bunch of competing enforcement agencies. For simplicity, let's assume for the moment that each enforcement agency is tie to certain court systems and visa versa. When you sign up with Protect, Inc., you agree to have any disputes involving yourself arbitrated in Protect, Inc.'s courts.

Suppose, though, that you're involved in a dispute with someone who isn't a customer of Protect, Inc., but belongs to the rival protection agency S.A.F.E. What then? Well, actually governments face a similar problem whenever citizens of two different states get into a dispute. If I, as an American, want to sue a guy from Canada, where will the case be heard? In practice different governments work out agreements between themselves on how to handle this, and I can see no reason why similar agreements wouldn't occur among competing private protection agencies (so if you read the fine print on your Protect, Inc. contract, you may find that you agree to have your disputes arbitrated in a S.A.F.E. court in certain circumstances).

Of course you could have an individual or agency that just refuses to make any such agreement. But the same is true among governments. Your hypo about a guy on his farm is functionally similar to the case of a guy who flees to a country that has no extradition treaty with the U.S., except that the extradition case is far more common.

I want to point out again that my questions about the farmer have been an attempt to understand how a putative anarchist society intends to define natural law. So my answers to Joe are:

1. I have no agency. I live on a farm and grow things. Occasionally I like to shoot missiles at Chicago.

2. Why does Taylor's or Chicago's or anyone else's agency or court or arbitrator, or any entity at all have the right to define natural law AS THEY SEE IT, and bind me to its tenets?

3. Regarding a mutually agree upon third party, I refuse to have anyone adjudicate my natural rights. They are mine to decide on my home turf.

I know this hypothetical has gone far afield. The reason for that isn't actually because the situation would have to be so ridiculous and unusual in order to create a difficulty for private justice. The reason is that it's easier, in my opinion, to think about extreme situations, because they crystallize the root issues involved. This method of reasoning (taking things to extremes in order to understand and highlight the mechanisms at work) can be very useful in many circumstances, and I've chosen to employ it in my hypothetical constructions.

Of course the situation is extremely murky legally and any system would have trouble resolving it!!! That was EXACTLY why I constructed it that way!! My point is that in a private justice system there is no central authority, and therefore no entity would have a right to adjudicate whether or not I had in fact been an aggressor.

Multiple replies to this thread have indicated that various entities such as Taylor's agency, next of kin's agency, a mutually agreed upon third party, or whomever, would have that right. However, if you claim that some entity is entitled to make decisions regarding the legality of my actions while I am on my own soil and not bound by any contract, then I ask you to walk through these two scenarios side by side:

A. Taylor pulls a carrot on me and announces his intention to kill me. In the dark alley, I mistake it for a gun and shoot him. B. I'm minding my own business, when I hear a gunshot over on my neighbor's property. I look, and I see Taylor lying dead in the alley.

A. Taylor's son, Jose, notifies his police agency and requests they go get me and hold me for trial in private court JusticeWhileYouWait.B. One day, I'm reading a good book, when police barge onto my property and detain me. They say I'm to be tried in private court InJusticeNoWaiting. I'm not sure what I've done, but they look serious.

A. I go to court and am convicted of murder. The precise penalty is irrelevant herein.B. I go to court and am astounded to find myself convicted of murdering Taylor (but the trial was quick, at least). Again, the precise penalty is not material to the scenario analysis.

Anticipating one objection:

"Biased or unfair courts and police agencies will be facing competitive pressure from the free market, and will not exist."

Baloney. First of all it's irrelevant to my analysis, since Tyler can easily create both of these agencies a day after his father's death, and come get me 2 days later. Obviously there are no restrictions on who can run a court or a police agency in a libertarian society, right? Second of all, the system you're describing is just begging for unscrupulous agencies such as the ones I have described.

Please explain why in case A justice has been served, but in case B it most certainly has not, and the distinction between the two, other than the ruling in court B was more "fair", using that word in a colloquial sense.

Pug, I think your scenario B illustrates why it would be important to subscribe to some kind of protection agency in an anarchist society. Without an agency to back you up, anyone could attack you, rob you, kill you, etc., and you would have no defense against this other than your own muscles and whatever weapons you had on you.

If you did subscribe to a protection agency, then anyone who wanted to come onto your property to get you would have to either get the agency to agree or go to war with it. Wars are costly, so it is in the interest of the different agencies to so agree as much as possible.

Presumably whatever agreements about interagency disputes were worked out would be written into the subscribers' contracts. If a potential subscriber didn't like these agreements, he could either go it alone (which, as seen above, has some serious disadvantages) or he could try to find another agency whose interagency agreements were more to his liking. The fewer interagency agreements a protection agency enters into, the higher its rates, ceteris paribus, since fewer agreements means a greater risk of war, which costs money. On the other hand, people presumably would be willing to pay higher rates to avoid the possibility of having their case heard in a court with inadequate procedural protections or overly harsh sentences. Over time you would expect agencies to converge on the level of procedural protections that balance quality with cost.

The same goes for the content of the law. Say you have two court systems, InJusticeNoWaiting, and Courts-R-Us. Courts-R-US recognizes a broader right of self-defense than does NoWaiting (in particular, Courts-R-Us says that if you think a guy has a gun but it turns out to be a carrot you can claim self-defense, whereas NoWaiting doesn't cotton to that). Different people will contract with NoWaiting or Courts-R-Us depending on whether they would rather have a broader or narrower rule on self-defense in cases involving them. If more people prefer the Courts-R-Us rule (or prefer it more strongly), that gives it an incentive to negotiate its interagency agreement with NoWaiting to stipulate that any disputes involving subscribers to both agencies will be judged using the Courts-R-Us rule (or visa versa, as the case may be).

"I'm asking you, before you even get into comparative statics, how a public justice system is logically coherent when it relies on violating justice (taxation, monopoly on force) to provide its results?"

Ancap in two easy steps:1) Assume the State is unjust.2) Therefore, the State is unjust!

I realize the phrasing I used is awkward but I would hope you would use interpret it in it's best light and see that what I meant in full is "I am not convinced by the current arguments I have heard regarding the necessity of Intellectual Property"

Maybe you could give us your take of why I am incorrect on IP being unnecessary and harmful?